Furman University alumnus Keith Lockhart returns to alma mater

"I would not have traded the background that I gained here as a musician -- and as a person -- for any of my colleagues' education at any of the larger and better-known music schools in the country," Lockhart told WYFF.

The Boston Pops performance at the Peace Center in Greenville is part of a 10-city tour across the Southeast.

The Furman Symphony Orchestra was invited to share the stage so that both orchestras could together perform the "1812 Overture" and "The Stars and Stripes Forever."

Before the rehearsal and performance, principal musicians with the Boston Pops coached Furman students.

"I really wanted to bring not just my story but a lot of other stories of colleagues who have carved out niches for themselves in a very competitive and difficult field," Lockhart said.

Lockhart graduated from Furman in 1981 -- long before many of the students were even born -- but his name is familiar to many.

"I'm a member of Phi Mu Alpha. It's our music fraternity on campus and he was actually a brother of Phi Mu Alpha," Joey Iannetta, a double major in music and computer science, told WYFF. "That's really cool."

Antonio Edwards, Jr. is a music education major at Furman.

"It's a very surreal experience knowing that Furman provides opportunities and trains musicians that are leaders in the real world," Edwards said. "That just gives us more incentive to work hard toward our musicianship so that we are able to be another Keith Lockhart or someone else prominent in the music world."

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